Thursday, 28 August 2014

My stock of A4 Isometric paper pads arrived today. About 20% of the print run is already sold thanks to the 99p preorder offer. I'll be posting out all the preorders over the next 2 days. If anyone would still like to grab some pads at the 99p price, I'll leave it running for a few more days before the normal price of £2.00 each kicks in.

Pads of white paper are very difficult to photograph (especially with a compact camera). However, this close-up shot hopefully shows off the advantages of lithographic printing. The vertical lines appear lighter because they are dotted. They still work as useful guides when drawing, but are less obtrusive on a finished map.

Saturday, 16 August 2014

Work on my Hall of Fire adventure continues to make steady progress. The map is almost finished, and I've written the first thousand words or so of the text. I've also mocked up a cover that incorporates a Fire Giant which Marg drew for me.

Wednesday, 13 August 2014

I've done a little more work on the Hall of Fire map today. There are still a few more 3d objects to add and a couple of other features. After that it will just need a key and it will be done. I say done but what it really needs is a few thousand words to make it fit for for purpose. I'd better get writing.

Sunday, 10 August 2014

I did a little more work on this map today. I now have an inked version ready for scanning, and a few 3d elements that need scanning and then reducing before I add them. Once the map's finished the real work begins writing it up as a B/X adventure.

Saturday, 9 August 2014

I doodled an isometric map earlier today in the park. It's just a rough pencil drawing for now but I added some grey shading to make it a little clearer. It's effectively a rethink on a Fire Giant lair taking inspiration from G3 Hall of the Fire Giant King. If I get time tomorrow, I'll produce a neater version in ink and see how it looks once I've scanned it.

I'm running a pre-order at the moment for A4 pads of isometric paper. Until 26th August they are just 99p each. Since I launched the pre-order offer a couple of days ago, I've had a great response and over 10% of the total print run of 250 pads is now sold.

Thursday, 7 August 2014

The next Squarehex pad of printed mapping paper will be an Isometric Graph Pad. The regular price will be £2.00 for a 30 sheet A4 pad. However, buy them before August 26th and you can get them for just 99p each. Flat rate shipping in the UK is £2.90. You may order as many other items as you like along with your preorder but they will only ship when the preordered items are ready. Overseas orders are welcome. Overseas shipping is calculated on the site, but I manually check all overseas orders and refund the difference if it is more than £1 greater than the actual cost.

The sheets in this pad will be litho-printed in light grey, landscape format, and glued to a card backboard. I've used dotted lines for the vertical lines so they are less intrusive. The sides of the triangles are all 7mm which means drawing maps isn't too cramped.

I'll still be back with another new Kickstarter in the near future, but I wanted to try out a preorder to see what response it gets. The main advantages it has over a Kickstarter are the faster turnaround (Kickstarter makes you wait over 2 weeks to get the funds after a campaign), and avoiding the 10-12% fees of a Kickstarter.